Aberystwyth Arts Centre
Artistsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; Residencies
In 2009 Aberystwyth Arts Centre, a department of
Aberystwyth University, opened an award winning
complex of eighteen Creative Studios, designed by
Thomas Heatherwick, for artists and creative
businesses; three of these distinctive units have been
reserved for use in a rolling programme of temporary
Artists in Residence. Since the Studios opened there
have been either two or three visual artists at a time,
from both the UK and elsewhere in the world, spending
three months 'in residence' in Aberystwyth. This
publication features the first 34 artists to take part in
the programme, which has been made possible by
funding from: EsmĂŠe Fairbairn Foundation, which
enabled the project to be first launched; Garfield
Weston Foundation; Wales Arts International, Laura

4

The residency
at Aberystwyth
gave me three
months of
uninterrupted
time to
concentrate on
my art practice,
which is an
amazing thing

Ashley Foundation, Meduse Quebec, Finnish Arts
Studio, Umbrella Arts Australia and Charles Wallace
Foundation (Pakistan); Aberystwyth Arts Centre
provided further financial and 'in kind' support.
Some moments from the past 3 years: an artist
making huge sculptures out of plastic bags and using
individual bags as the subjects of her films - ethereal,
unexpectedly beautiful; another blacking out his studio
windows, working long hours making a film by drawing
with torchlight; another involving new local friends and
contacts in his performances and films which pay
tribute to arcane folk practices. Yet others have

Such a
residency
should be a
mandatory
event for all
artists

painted, drawn, made ceramics and researched
throughout their time in Aberystwyth, made
installations and performances and installed
permanent sculptures. Each artist gives a free public
talk about their work and holds Open Studio towards
the end of their stay, and many have made lasting
friends and connections.
So what are visual artists' residencies for? Most visual
artists tend to work in relative isolation, often with a
'portfolio career' to keep the books balanced; over
time an artist's career has fewer official milestones

5

than many professions. A residency is part award,
part 'time out', part stimulus to the imagination. There
are many different models of residencies, but the aim
of Aberystwyth Arts Centre's programme has been to
offer artists the opportunity for supported, self-directed
time in which to research and develop individual
artistic practice, and the chance to exchange ideas in
a creative atmosphere. As an artist commented:
'Artists' residencies are invaluable. They provide not
only space and time but a complete mental break
from routine.'
The communities of Aberystwyth and the Arts Centre
also benefit from residencies, which offer an engaging
and immediate insight into artists' working practices.
The public talks and Open Studio sessions, which all
artists in residence deliver, act as a bridge between
the artists and local people. More directly, some of the
residencies have included participatory sessions for
the public; although these need additional fund-raising
in order to cover professional fees for the artists, they
have proved to be effective both for the participants
and for the resident artists who become rooted in the
community more quickly.

6

I will mention
the Arts
Residency in
glowing terms
to any future
audiences I
have when
giving talks
and classes.

An independent evaluation of the Artists' Residency
programme in 2010 and 2011 was commissioned;
this proved overwhelmingly positive, and offered
suggestions for future development. Extracts from the
report follow:

Evaluation of Residencies programme at
Aberystwyth Arts Centre (extract)
by Clare Thomas Arts Consultant
It is clear from this evaluation of the first complete
cycle of the Artists' Residencies Programme at
Aberystwyth Arts Centre that the programme has
fulfilled, indeed has exceeded its aims. The artists'
views, which are mirrored by those of staff, indicate

It was an
honour to be
chosen for this
residency.
Thank you for
the excellent
experience.

that the programme is well thought out, well managed,
with good systems and support mechanisms in place.
It meets the needs of the artists extremely well.
Mutual benefits
In common with many other such schemes, the Arts Centre
Programme and its associated local, regional and even
national communities (of artists, visitors, participants etc.) have
benefitted from residencies as much if not more than the

7

artists. The positive impact the residency programme has
already had on the Arts Centre, such as raising profile, status,
increased community engagement, greater access to
international networks, the creation of and access to new
work, and the development and re-invigoration of audiences,
provides powerful arguments for the further development of
the programme.
The Artists' Residencies Programme, the only one of its kind
in Wales, therefore, can already demonstrate the contribution
it makes to the local community, and to the arts at regional
and in some cases, at national level.
A powerful means of creative innovation
The injection of fresh creative ideas and energy
through the diverse range of artists who visit
Aberystwyth cannot be underestimated, bearing in
mind Aberystwyth's rural location. The contribution the
programme makes to the overall development of
partnerships, creative output, bodies of work, profile
and status, is perhaps difficult to quantify, but is
significant in its impact on the work and development
of the Arts Centre at all levels.
The contribution to the arts regionally and nationally
The very many interactions between artists, local
communities, visitors and local people provided
8

Simply to
have the time
and space to
work as an
artist in a
supportive
environment
is incredibly
important

evidence of a substantial contribution to the region, for
example through links with the National Library of
Wales, and the events organised by the Arts Centre,
including the International Ceramics Festival. Activities
in which the artists were involved included:
o

resident artist talks

o

end of residency shows

o

activities at the National Library of Wales and
other local venues

o

workshops, studio openings and local
exhibitions

o

social contact with local and other
visiting artists

In terms of the impact on the arts in Wales, artists felt
that the programme is stimulating new work which will
raise the reputation of Aberystwyth in a national
context. One artist stated:
I think the whole programme is making Aberystwyth

Most beautiful
studio I have
ever worked
inâ&#x20AC;Ś Lighting
was excellent,
natural light
provided by
the skylights
and windows
was perfect.

a richer and more innovative artistic hub.
The accumulation of artists from different cultures
and practices has [made this happen].
another said:
I am currently making work resulting from research
9

undertaken whilst at Aberystwyth and I believe that
this body of work contributes to the arts in Wales.
...I foresee that as the international element of the
residencies develop, so too will the relationships with
international arts organisations. Aberystwyth is
geographically remote and so I see this as a real
positive. New philosophies on making art, diverse
practicesâ&#x20AC;Ś

In summary the scheme:
o

Exceeded expectations of the resident artists

o

Benefitted their creative development

o

Provided beautiful studios, accessible 24/7,
in which to take time out

o

Benefitted the Arts Centre in a number of
important ways: raising its profile and status,
bringing in new ideas and creative energy,
developing new audiences and stimulating
local artistic communities

o

Provided opportunities for artists to visit other
places and people in Wales, and become
familiar with Wales as a place to work

o

Provided welcome and essential financial
support for artists

10

I was really
well looked
after and
had loads of
funâ&#x20AC;Ś I have it
in mind to
return to
Aberystwythâ&#x20AC;Ś

It has the potential to:
o

Develop an international profile

o

Make stronger links with the arts
communities in Wales.

o

Provide more professional development
for artists.

o

Develop in other ways such as through
themed programmes, e.g. print making,
sculpture.

o

Build through alumni the potential for
future festivals (real and virtual),
mentoring and collaboration.

Gallery and
artists' visits
gave me a
deeper
understanding
of where I am
in terms of
professional
development
and where I
want to go.
11

Notes:

Aberystwyth (population c. 25,000) is a

town at the edge of Cardigan Bay, surrounded by sea
and the beautiful landscape of Wales. Though small
and relatively isolated it punches above its weight as
it is home to institutions including Aberystwyth
University, the National Library of Wales, the National
Screen and Sound Archive of Wales, the Royal
Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments
of Wales among other organisations which have
provided fruitful seams to mine for some artists in
residence, and supply a great mix of expertise and
interest for those who are inclined to follow it up.
â&#x20AC;&#x153;The latest theories of economic development, for
example those forwarded by Manuel Castells, stress
the importance of place, culture and identity in
economic prospects. Aberystwyth Arts Centre
provides both the 'bread' of jobs and incomes in the
locality, and the 'circus' of high quality arts
performance and cultural space that protects and
develops the uniqueness of its local place.â&#x20AC;?
Economic Impact Study, Cardiff Business school

12

"I was
completely
charmed by
Aberystwyth
and Wales."

Aberystwyth Arts Centre is a department of
Aberystwyth University and a vibrant, award winning
arts facility; it is the largest arts centre in Wales,
including 2 galleries, theatre, concert hall, cinema and
more, with a wide-ranging programme of events and
activities across all art forms as well as a thriving
community arts education programme. In 2000, the
Arts Centre completed a major ÂŁ4.3 million
redevelopment project largely funded by the National
Lottery, and has facilities unrivalled throughout much
of the UK; leading it to be recognised as a national
centre for arts development and described as a
'national flagship for the arts.' Over 700,000 visitors
a year are welcomed.

"Staff at the Arts
Centreâ&#x20AC;Śwent out of
their way to assist with
any problem that I faced
technically, or in terms
of needing promotional
materials, etc."

13

The award winning Creative Studios in
which the resident artists are based were designed by
the award winning Thomas Heatherwick studio and
their construction was supported by the Welsh
Development Agency and the Arts Council of Wales.
With their crinkled stainless steel cladding they look

"Most beautiful studio
I have ever worked in...
Lighting was excellent,

very distinctive but the interiors are practical,
accessible to the disabled and easily adaptable to
many needs. The Studios are occupied long term by
artists and creative businesses, apart from the three
reserved for residencies. Funding for residencies to
date has been generously given by various charitable
bodies including Esmee Fairbairn Foundation - without
whose generous support it would not have been
possible to launch the programme. Other support has
been forthcoming from: Garfield Weston Foundation;
Wales Arts International, Laura Ashley Foundation,
Meduse Quebec, Finnish Arts Studio, Umbrella Arts
Australia and Charles Wallace Foundation (Pakistan).
Aberystwyth Arts Centre provides further financial and
'in kind' support.

Elen Bonner
Elen Bonner's work questions the current
cultural geography of rural Wales using as
content the customs she witnesses in
order to understand her own identity and
that of those around her. By using text,
poetry and drama alongside film and
installation, her work questions who is most
powerful in assigning a place its character
and values. Is it the inhabitants themselves
who are ultimately responsible for their own
cultural demarcation; or could it be the
outside world and its projections that are
most influential in determining how Wales
is understood?
The film which resulted from Elen's
residency at Aberystwyth won the Ifor
Davies Award at the National Eisteddfod
for Wales and has been exhibited
extensively. Elen Bonner lives and work in
Ruthin, Wales, where she is currently
Education Officer at Ruthin Craft Centre.

"it only goes to show
what can be achieved
when given the creative
time and space required
to make new work. The
film that resulted from
the residency won the
Ifor Davies Award at the
National Eisteddfod for
Wales . It has been
exhibited extensively
and is also held in the
National Screen and
Sound Archive."

Claudia Borgna
“My artificial temporary landscapes are
the material result of an ongoing
observation, questioning as to how the
man made and the natural realms interact
with one another and come to create new,
ephemeral orders.
Plastic bags have become my main
medium; they epitomize the perfect and
quintessential discarded object. To me,
plastic bags are symbolic embryos that
contain our lifestyles and are also the
vessels that take them forward in their
journey. Their contradictory qualities
mirror the neurotic course of our life:
plastic bags are in-fact both worthless
and useful, disposable and recyclable,
flimsy and strong.
I like to lure the viewers into a virtual
extension of modern life that substitutes
the old idealised concept of nature and
landscape with a romanticised
contemporary one. A dreamlike floating
vision: drifting from the tangible to the
intangible.”
During her residency at Aberystwyth
Claudia made new film work and sculpture
which has been shown in the USA.
WWW.CLAUDIABORGNA.KEEPFREE.DE

"I see residencies as
particularly precious
opportunities to
experiment and take
new risks in a
supportive
environment. They are
also a vital source of
inspiration and a way to
inform my work through
new landscapes and
people."

Zoe Childerley
Zoe Childerley's lens-based work explores
new environments. It is developed by
interaction with different communities and
inspired by the discovery of intertwining
and lost histories. Her photography also
examines our relationship with the natural
world, our imagination and the power of
narrative; creating otherworldly images
inspired by folk tales from around the
world, crossing cultures and generations.
She has continued with the work she
began in Wales, looking at the way in
which myth and story are memorialised in
Welsh culture; the project will be exhibited
in Aberystwyth Arts Centre in late 2012.
Zoe Childerley has exhibited nationally and
internationally and undertaken numerous
commissions and residencies, working in
the Caribbean, the Middle East, South
East Asia, the US and across the UK. She
is currently a lecturer in Photography and
Video at De Montfort University.

"Residencies have
provided invaluable
opportunity to spend time
developing my practice
when it is difficult to find
financial and professional
support as an artist. The
Aberystwyth residency
led to productive
collaboration with other
artists both on the
programme and locally."

35

Priya Chohan
“My practice grows organically out of a
playful and intense experimentation with
material. I create process-intensive works,
building up delicate and often ephemeral
surfaces. Graphite has become a core
material to my practice, both physically and
conceptually. My non-image based work
remains highly descriptive; moon-like
surfaces pulsate next to scratchy grounds
and traditional techniques are implemented
to unpredictable effect.
I concurrently work on several ideas in the
studio and so, as a result, the works inform
each other and relationships develop
between them: visually, through organic
marks and the works' physicality, as well
as in the way they relate to my ideas about
mark-making and the expanded idea of
sculpture as drawing. I make works, which,
as individual objects are small and intimate
- together they create a rich, dense
assemblage.”
Priya Chohan's works have been
included in the exhibition ' 5' at Aberystwyth
Arts Centre in 2010; the catalogue can be
viewed on the Arts Centre;'s website. Priya
is currently teaching in London and
working towards an exhibition at Parfitt
Gallery, Croydon.
36

"Aberystwyth had a
significant impact
on my practice...and
I'm still working on
ideas that were
planted whilst there.
It was an inspiring
place to be."

Ralph Colmar
Ralph Colmar is a film and animation artist
who specialises in working with
artificial light and long exposure
photography. He started experimenting
with nocturnal long exposure images in the
1980s; by 1997 he had completed an M.A.
in European Fine Art and was creating site
specific installations featuring long
exposure photographs of nocturnal
landscapes, or 'Lightscapes'. He also
developed a technique of drawing with
light, using a hand held torch, which he
used to great effect in several films. During
his stay in Aberystwyth, he created a film
animation of Rutland Boughton's opera
'The Immortal Hour', using light drawing;
this has become one of his four mostscreened works. This work was included in
the exhibition ' 5' at Aberystwyth Arts
Centre in 2010; the catalogue can be
viewed on the Arts Centre's website.

Matthew Cowan
“My practice is in the realm of traditional
British and European customs. I make
works that are photographs, videos,
installations and performances, which play
with the strangeness of long established
folk customs in a modern world.
These works can be viewed as mock folk
performances in themselves, playing with
the elements of folk rituals that give people
a link to the past. In contemporary
European societies, people have a peculiar
relationship with their folk traditions that is
part uneasiness about their past, and part
fascination with spectacle and long
established ritual.
At Aberystwyth I worked on a performance
piece inspired by the tales of the devil in
Wales, described by the eighteenth
century clergyman Edmund Jones, as well
as some new portraits involving Welsh folk
costume.”
www.matthewcowan.net

"...the period of time
allocated at
Aberystwyth for simply
getting on with your
practice without the
thought of a specific
deadline or project
outcome in mind was
very precious and rare.
It allows you to
experiment in ways that
are very important for
growing your approach
to new work, and also
to take notice of all the
other artists working
around you."

40

Dave Cushley
Dave Cushley was trained in art at
Manchester, Falmouth and Cardiff.
Primarily a sculptor both in training and
practice, he also works with installation,
performance, and drawing. He describes
his work as 'an irreverent fusion of the
absurd, post-structuralism, and an
unhealthy obsession with the nature of
craft ' and indeed an examination of the
nature of making or craft is usually central
to his work. He experiments with materials
which are often recycled, with techniques
and with their meanings and associations;
allowing both artist and viewer free play in
creating anew. His work in Aberystwyth
resulted in a group of multi media
sculptures.
Dave Cushley has recently completed a
residency and solo exhibition in Madrid; he
lives and works in Cardiff.

"The residency was
great for me. It gave me
the chance I needed to
get going, and was the
first time I'd had where I
was able to focus on
developing my work
since university."

David Cushway
David Cushway's practice draws on craft
techniques, drawing, performance, film and
installation. His use of clay and his
understanding of its place in human history
renders it a particularly potent medium for
his expressive works. During his
Aberystwyth residency he concentrated on
drawing.
“My work is underpinned by a fascination
with clay as a medium; the history of clay
use is the history of humanity; it is the
material that binds us to the earth that we
inhabit. The constant cycle of life and death
is a recurring theme within my practice,
and the use of my own body within a
figurative narrative reflects this... My
practice operates in the arenas between
art and craft and is often a direct comment
upon the difference and indeed common
ground between the two. “
David Cushway lives and works in Cardiff
www.davidcushway.co.uk

"in terms of residences,
I have completed many
over the years and all
have them have marked
a sea change in my
practice, it may be a
cliché but just simply to
have the time and
space to work as an
artist in a supportive
environment is
incredibly important,
and if not for the
residency at Aber I
would not have been
able to complete the
two works ..."

44

Hannah Downing
Hannah Downing is an artist from Wales
whose practice includes painting, drawing
and collage, centred on an interest in
pictorial realism.
“I make work that explores the relationship
between pictorial convention and that
which we consider to be reality. I consider
my subject matter to be the language of
things like the out of focus bits in a
photograph; the elevated viewpoint of a
CCTV image; perspective and
panoramas.”
Hannah spent her time in Aberystwyth
developing her painting practice. Having
recently worked as part of the invigilation
team for Wales' pavilion at the Venice
Biennale, Hannah is making works from
imagery and observations gathered there.
She currently lives and works in Swansea.
www.hannahdowning.co.uk

"Not only was it an
intense period of
concentration to
explore and develop
new ideas, but it also
became a time when I
thought a lot about
what being an artist
meant to me."

Fern Thomas; Owen Griffiths; Adele Vye: FAO
FAO was a three person collaborative
group, founded in Swansea by graduates
from the Fine Art course at Oxford Brookes
University: Fern Thomas, Adele Vye and
Owen Griffiths. Although their individual
practices differed, their eclectic
collaboration focused on interactive and
participatory art, often with an emphasis on
environmental concerns. Their work took
the form of interactive actions and live
events, to film through to drawing and
photographically documented actions.
Their work in Aberystwyth resulted in film
and installation.
Since their residency, each has been
actively exhibiting and researching; Owen
Griffiths received an MA from Wimbledon
College of Art in 2010; Fern Thomas is
currently studying for an MA
Interdisciplinary Arts at Oxford Brookes
University, Oxford.

"...space to develop
ideas and experiment
without the pressure of
creating a finished
piece."

Dafydd Fortt
Dafydd Fortt is drawn to the act of walking
to navigate both real and imagined places.
The source of his work springs and
radiates from his journeys through his
native Welsh landscape; his walks around
mid Wales during his residency resulted in
large scale paintings.
For Dafydd the principles of Haiku are
instructive and his work aims to be simple
and limited. Like one step after another
and armed with the symmetries in
countless natural structures he slowly
builds something greater than its individual
parts, something with meaning and
purpose. The work functions less as an art
object and more as an articulation of
space, bringing the outdoors in; it gives the
gallery an energy force and in true
Huckleberry spirit reaches back to the
romance of the natural and the allure of the
moment.
Dafydd Fortt lives and works in Cardiff,
Wales.

"Studios are great!
The space is
accessible, the light is
good and it’s a nice
space to spend time in."

Evelyn Grant
Evelyn Grant is a graduate of both the
University of Calgary, and Alberta College
of Art fine arts programmes and she has
been a practicing artist since 1976.
Although she works primarily in the
ceramic medium, she has also worked on
several large-scale mixed media pieces
Her ceramic work is created using a
combination of hand building techniques
and slip cast forms, with a strong focus on
the narrative, while working within the
parameters of functional ceramic objects. .
She often casts found objects to
incorporate into her work, and includes
vintage imagery; the markets and
museums which she visited in the UK were
a great source of materials and inspiration.

Rabab Ghazoul
Rabab Ghazoul is a visual artist who draws
on a range of media to explore the
nuances of social relations, and the shifting
nature of personal and political affiliation.
Working with video, installation, site and
text as well as interventions within the
public realm, her work often takes the form
of process-based investigations into
community, language, and identity, but
often at their point of fragmentation or
transition. Born and part raised in the
Middle East, her experience of dual
cultures informs her approach as a social
observer and commentator, and underpins
her ongoing interest in our negotiations and
constructions of the political.
She is currently composing a six-part
choral work to mark the10th anniversary
2013 of the Iraq invasion, and is also
developing a new video work which seeks
to restage and film, with members of the
public, extracts from the Chilcot Inquiry
testmonials. She is also applying for a
Leverhulme award to further the research
begun during her Aberystwyth residency.
Born in Mosul, Iraq, Rabab Ghazoul lives
and works in Cardiff, Wales.

"Residencies can be great
opportunities to reflect and
explore one's practice
without the pressure to
produce finished work - I
feel I was really given free
reign to do that at
Aberystwyth. I ended up
making work I couldn't
possibly have made
without being in that
particular place at that
time, and that's a
wonderful benefit - to really
open up your practice to
the unexpected."

Haider Ali
Haider Ali is an artist from Pakistan, who
spent three months in Aberystwyth thanks
to a grant from Charles Wallace Trust.
During his residency in a culture very
different to any he had visited before, he
made animated films on political themes.
“I was brought up in Lahore's inner or old
city, known for among other things, its
celebration of Muharram. One of the
rituals of Muharram is for men to beat
themselves with knives. As a child I used
to dream of the day I would become a
part of the community, earning the respect
of my elders. My work is inquisitive;
through it, I try to make sense of the world
around me….”

Lucy Harvey
Lucy Harvey regards herself as a
'conceptual metalsmith', using craft
processes and assemblage to make
jewellery and small scale sculpture. By
changing or subverting the usual function
of an object, she creates ambiguous
sculptures which explore our anxieties and
desires.
“ (I am an) artist, museum geek and
jeweller. I make disconcerting things in
metal, collect old things...”
Lucy Harvey's works have been included
in the exhibition ' 5' at Aberystwyth Arts
Centre in 2010; the catalogue can be
viewed on the Arts Centre;'s website. She
was trained in Silversmithing and Jewellery
in Manchester and Birmingham; she
exhibits regularly and is currently teaching
at Manchester Art School and Lincoln
College of Art and design.

"I feel I am in a much
stronger position in my
creative career thanks
to the residency."

Michel Huneault
Michel Huneault is a photographer whose
work as an international development
expert was often in conflict areas. In the
midst of dramatic political events he was
nevertheless continually struck by
mundane moments in the troubled areas
he visited; the beautiful, stoic moments of
everyday life which constitute human
history. In 2004, he was apprenticed to
Gilles Peress at Magnum Photo in New
York City and this became an important
turning point for his photographic work,
which he now pursues professionallyseeking the extraordinary in everyday
moments of life, particularly in challenging
circumstances
Michel Huneault had a solo exhibition
'Histoires Normales' at Aberystwyth Arts
Centre in 2011. He lives and works in
Canada.

"I truly appreciated the
informal relationship
with the centreâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s staff
and leadership, a
perceived genuine
commitment to both
acknowledged
established and
emerging artists..."

Richard Ibghy
Richard Ibghy's work uses the allusive and
deconstructive features of language 'to
interrogate knowledge-formations,
institutional contexts, and social and
political entanglements.' His work typically
exhibits a minimalist approach to form and
construction of the art object. His recent
projects explore how desire and belief
influence economic discourse and
practices, sustain current economies, but
also carry the potential for inciting new
forms of 'doing economy'.
During his residency in Aberystwyth he
worked on Sceptics Will Be Entertained but
Perhaps Unimpressed, a multi-channel
video installation exploring the possibilities
of economic observation, which
incorporates original video footage filmed in
and around Aberystwyth along with
archival materials sourced in the National
Library of Wales.
Richard Ibghy lives and works in Canada;
he often works collaboratively with artist
Marilou Lemmens.

"I was able to conduct
research with excellent
facilities very close by National Library of
Wales and the
University Library."

Vicki Kerr
Vicki Kerr is studying for a PhD in Fine Art
at Goldsmiths University, London. Her
recent work draws on her past experiences
as an air traffic controller, in a project
examining questions around airspace;
using as a focus an aeroplane crash from
the 1970s and the eruption of an Icelandic
volcano in 2010.
'As an artist, I have a strong theoretical
interest in the past event and its document.
I am interested in the unregulated dispersal
of images distributed through mass media
and the way it converges upon empirically
grounded monolithic systems that aspire
towards comprehensive totality and stability
through their own set of formal logics and
structural parameters.'
Vicki Kerr exhibited the work she began to
work on during her residency in Wales at
Aberystwyth Arts Centre in 2011. She was
born in New Zealand; she now lives and
works in London.

Sai Hua Kuan
Sai Hua Kuan was born in Singapore and
graduated from Slade School of Fine Art,
London; he now lives and works both in
the United Kingdom and Singapore. His art
is realised in a diverse and often
unconventional range of media, including
installation, sculpture, film, photography
and performance. Recent works include an
interactive performance sculpture for an
exhibition at Jendela, Esplanade
Singapore, a tongue-in-cheek critique of
the economic and productive relationship
between animals and people; and a solo
exhibition at Yavuz Fine Art, Singapore.
“I play with materials, enjoying the process
of transforming forms, shapes, or even
smells and humidity. Form is a very
important process in my idea gestation. I
enjoy very much the ways in dismantling,
deconstructing and reconstructing
materials and objects, as my thoughts
often come to me spontaneously during
the playful process.”
www.saihuakuan.com

"I greatly appreciate
the valuable and
quality experience
that the residency has
provided to me.
The period of quiet
time has greatly
facilitated me in
developing my art
practice and
generating ideas.
A group of ideas
conceived in
Aberystwyth has been
just presented in a
show..."

66

Riikka Makikoskela
“The basis of my artistic working is cultural,
but my approach is physical and material.
Through my practice, I seek alternative
ways of being, thinking and living in our
society. My perspective is distinctly
Scandinavian, and, specifically, that of a
married woman who had children at a
younger age than the national average.
There are many agreed, cultural
references in our day-to-day living, and art
is one of these. Yet everything is in flux.
The experience of living cannot be frozen
into two dimensions. That's why I'm a
sculptor.
For me, both the choice of material and the
ways in which it is manipulated are
significant; both have cultural implications.
As such, my use of media is wide-ranging from the traditional materials of sculpture to
the basic substances of everyday life.
Tactile engagement with these materials is
paramount. I enjoy working by hand,
responding to the bodily interaction as my
pieces evolve.”
Riikka Makikoskela produced several
sculptural works during her Welsh
residency, including some made from
coloured liquorice laces. She lives and
works in Finland.
68

"I was able to
experiment with new
materials and media
(clay and ceramics). I
am very glad about the
co-operation with Roger
in Ceramic Workshop,
he was so helpful."

Heather Phillipson
Heather Phillipson works with moving
image, sound, text and voice. Her current
practice uses HD video in single-screen
and live formats, the latter in conjunction
with live voice-off. She exhibits nationally
and internationally, and has received
awards, commissions and residencies. In
2011, she showed work at the South
London Gallery, Auto Italia LIVE, the ICA,
the Serpentine Gallery, Hackney Film
Festival (with LUX), Vitrine Gallery,
Hollybush Gardens, Eastside Projects
(Birmingham), KG52 (Stockholm) and g39
at Halle 14 (Leipzig). She is also an awardwinning poet, published by Faber and
Faber in the Faber New Poets series. Her
work was exhibited in Aberystwyth Arts
Centre in 2011.
The artist's current and forthcoming
exhibitions and projects include 'Seeing in
the Dark', CIRCA (Newcastle), 'An
Observer's Guide to the Garden Marathon',
Serpentine Gallery (London) and an
exhibition at Flat Time House (London) in
2012. She has also been awarded a place
on the LUX Associate Artists Programme
2011-12.

"The residency at
Aberystwyth Arts Centre
was, for me, a crucial
breathing-space which
enabled me to re-negotiate
my approach and establish
new points of departure for
my work."

Ellie Rees
Ellie Rees works in performance video, often
exploring the contradictory ideas embedded in
contemporary culture: Among the works she
created while in Aberystwyth were 'Beyond
Narcissus' and 'Pretty Eyed Pirate Smile'.
“Through my work I aim to explore the
contradictory attractions of emancipated
female roles and the romantic dreams
proposed by popular and traditional culture.
The use of humour and irony as a subtext is
an essential part of most of the work as I
investigate what it means to be female and an
artist. My work manifests as performance
video, most often made in response to my
immediate surroundings. I am interested in
taking narratives - specific to a place and its
culture (particularly romantic stories involving
heroines), and creating performances inspired
by themes from these narratives. “
Ellie Rees lives in London where she is
currently an Associate Lecturer at Byam
Shaw School of Art, Central St. Martins
College of Art and Design. She has exhibited
and performed internationally at galleries and
museums including: Tate Modern, London,
The Institute for Contemporary Art (ICA)
London; El Museo de Arte Contemporaneo,
Caracas,Venezuela,
72

Soozy Roberts
Soozy Roberts uses performance, film and
installation to explore the mysteries of
every day life, often in a darkly humorous
way. She uses her own body to address
questions about femaleness and femininity,
while acknowledging a wider environment
saturated in provocative and glamorous
female imagery. She grew up on a farm 'in
the middle of nowhere Wales, milking
cows, making silage....' and her work often
gives a nostalgic nod towards the ideas of
family, domesticity, sometimes Welshness.
During her stay in Aberystwyth, and
despite the challenges of having a young
baby, Soozy Roberts created
performances at different venues in town
and in her Studio. She is currently living
and performing regularly in Stroud, as well
as curating performance arts events and
running a young person's contemporary
arts group at Stroud Valley Artspace. She
also continues to work on interaction and
outreach projects at Arnolfini, Bristol.

"I was really pleased to
have been given the
opportunity and felt
very lucky to undertake
the residency."

Michelle Sank

76

Michelle Sank's photography reflects her
intense interest in the human condition and
to this end can be viewed as social
documentary. Most of her work
encompasses issues around social and
cultural diversity. The project she
completed during her residency in
Aberystwyth, 'The Submerged', has been
published in book form by Schilt. The
Independent commented: 'Sank's work
...exists in a hinterland between landscape
photography, portraiture and social
documentary. "Sociological landscapes",
she calls them; pictures about how people
are products of their environment. (In the
accompanying essay), Liz Wells considers
Sank's evocative, "ordinary yet compulsive"
pictures in terms of their narrative
content."What brought the middle-aged
woman in the yellow shalwar kameez ...
to this part of the country? Why is one boy
leaping over tufts of grass?" These
mysteries are a part of the pleasure of The
Submerged.'
Michelle Sank is currently working on 2
projects - one around the death of her
father and the other about a gypsy
community. She was born in Cape Town,
South Africa and has been living in
England since the late 1980s.

".. residencies are
really important in
providing artists with
the time and space to
develop new work,
something that is
often difficult to
balance in one's
normal daily life."

Pamela Schilderman
Pamela Schilderman's practice
encompasses drawing, painting and
photography as well as three-dimensional
work. These share key motifs such as the
circular form as well as ideas of change, of
repetition and of the interaction between
knowledge and intelligence. She is
currently working on a large-scale threedimensional drawing which ' aims to
explore what essentially makes a drawing;
mark making.'
“I wish my art to appear organic but
simultaneously bear no resemblance to a
specific thing or form in nature... I strive to
encourage the viewer to abandon the
weighted significance we attach to
explanations and literal meaning. (In
Allusions)... the art invites the viewer to lose
his or her sense of time, to become so
involved that in the first instance 'how' or
'why' is forgotten.”
Pamela Schilderman is based in Rugby,
West Midlands

"Residencies have
enabled me to complete
challenging artwork I
would not otherwise
have had the chance to
do. They provided much
needed time, space and
support and I still keep
in touch with contacts
made through
residencies.
Aberystwyth was
unique in that I received
invaluable professional
expertise for my project
from university staff."

78

Annabelle Shelton
Annabelle Shelton is a painter whose usual
and distinctive medium is paint on large
aluminium panels. Her work usually
explores the patterns and shapes made by
people in an urban setting or landscape;
her scenes include streets, road crossings,
events, parks and popular beach settings
from which she eradicates all architecture,
skies, street furniture and evidence of
nature - leaving individual human figures
making patterns in relation to each other.
“The unfinished look of the work is
deliberate, as the white negative space is
like a void of nothingness but also gives
the viewer a visual resting space. White
space is often present in my work and
signifies that which does not need to be
said. The intention of my work is subtle and
necessary in its rendering, for the
quietness. “
http://www.annabelleshelton.com

Kate Street
Kate Street's practice encompasses
painting, drawing, sculpture and film. She
has used proverbs and myth as a starting
point for assemblages, while a series of
botanically themed drawings create
strange new hybrid forms.
The attractive beauty and delicacy of
technique in many of Street's works belies
a sombre or even macabre undertone.
She is currently exploring “the feminine
within witchcraft, more specifically the body
as a vessel for the unexplained and
fabricated.” Among the works she
completed in Aberystwyth was a series of
short films ' Mererid's Duty'.
Kate Street is based in London. Her
showreel 'From Slapstick to Horror' recently
toured various festivals including Latitude;
she will be exhibiting 'The Future is Now' at
the Torrance Art Museum in California and
'She Devil - MACRO' at the Museum of
Contemporary Art in Rome.

"Aber made me
reconsider the way in
which I was making
drawings. I had
developed quite fixed
studio habits, and it
gave me the chance to
try new ways of
working "

Katherine Sullivan
Katherine Sullivan is a sculptor, who began
her creative career as a costume-maker.
Her sculptures relate to the human body
and its relationship with architecture;
she also works with photomontage.
She exhibited both her sculptures and
the photomontages created during her
residency at Aberystwyth Arts Centre
in 2011.
“My work inhabits the common ground
between clothing and architecture. I see
them both as metaphors for the body. The
crafts involved in clothing and building often
overlap in my work and I share the views
of the great architects of modernism that
the very nature of architecture can be
identified with textile. To these architects, a
building is 'worn' and not occupied. Their
understanding of body, clothes, structure
and ornament as one, underpins the
perceptual framework for my sculpture.”

"very grateful for the
opportunity, enjoyed
the brilliant facilities at
the Arts Centre."

Clare Thornton
Clare Thornton collects stories and
curiosities to inspire the sculptures, textile
pieces, costumes and live social events
which make up her practice; drawing on
performance, fine art and craft techniques.
She is curious about the memories and
stories we attach to personal objects, and
plays with everyday materials to create
installations and 'scenes' which reflect the
people and places where she works.
Clare's Aberystwyth residency, thanks to
additional funding from Laura Ashley,
included participatory workshops for local
groups and subsequently an installation in
the Arts Centre gallery. A seamstress for
20 years, she studied for an MA in Theatre
Studies & Literature at the University of
Glasgow. She lives & works in Bristol .

Jean Yves Vigneau
“I was born in the Magdalen Islands on the
east coast of Canada. Over the years I
translated my attachment to the maritime
world into a body of work that includes
sculptures, installations, drawings,
photographs and videos. During my
residency in Aberystwyth, I spent a lot of
time exploring the magnificent coastline of
Wales, culminating in a trip to the mythical
Bardsey Island. I came to the realisation
that only a mirror can tell the objective
beauty of the sea and that words of the
Welsh language could become poetic
landscapes.
Sentinel is a simple optical device inspired
by the camera obscura that, since 1880,
has drawn many visitors to Aberystwyth,
Wales. This in-situ sculpture, with its large
convex mirror, was installed on top of
Constitution Hill, Aberystwyth: it offers a
new point of view of the town's spectacular
seascape and was created in the spring of
2009 at part of my residency.
Jean Yves Vigneau lives & works in
Canada.

Petri Virtanen
Petri Virtanen is an accomplished Finnish
photographer and musician, whose works
are influenced by imagery from fantasy
and horror genres.
“My artistic work is in different media:
photography, music, painting, drawing,
video, poems. My photos mainly evolve
around staged images of horror, surrealism
and fantasy, I try to create another world
far away from the normal everyday life.
They are like still pictures of a strange
movie, or moments in a performance
piece. As for painting and drawing, when I
was a kid, I went wild over horror comic
books, and I wanted to become a comic
book artist. Sometimes I still do, and I keep
on drawing these subconscious pictures
that come from nowhere and make their
own way out. But whatever the medium, I
usually try to fill the frames with maximum
dynamics, wide angles and action, or
restless and mostly blackish still life.”

"Aberystwyth has
been a very rewarding
place, and it has
sparked so many
ideas, themes and new
directions, that
sometimes I feel quite
exhausted, I wish there
were three more
months to go, to get
the ball really rolling!"

Pete Williams
Pete Williams is an artist who primarily
works with print and sculpture; he is known
for his alternative approach to printmaking
and in particular for his large scale wood
cuts. He founded the Print Market
Workshop in Cardiff in 1997, which
recently re-launched in new premises as
the Print Market Project. His work with the
Project helps and advises artists to develop
their work through a range of print making
techniques, promoting the diversity of
possibilities available through the medium
of fine art print.
During his stay in Aberystwyth Pete
Williams produced many works including
sculptures and large sale prints. He
recently opened his first solo exhibition
of prints in New York and has established
an exchange for artists between the
Print Market Project Cardiff and the Robert
Blackburn Printmaking Workshop New
York.

"It gave me time out
to allow me to catch
up with my own work
and ideas but also to
revaluate. Having
people to come and
see me here has also
helped as I feel they
do look at your work
in a more favourable
way. In short, it helps
one to progress."

"Artists' residencies are invaluable.
They provide not only space and time to
produce but also initiate a complete mental
break from routine: the opportunity to view
practice and positions afresh. The residency
at Aberystwyth Arts Centre was, for me, a
crucial breathing-space which enabled me to
re-negotiate my approach and establish new
points of departure for my work." Heather Phillipson

“It really did feed in to all my current
successes, thank you”

Jennifer Price

“I loved having all the arts at my fingertips
and access to the cinema, theatre and opera
and access to both libraries”

Alison McDonald

Artists Artistiaid December Rhagfyr 2011 – September Medi 2014
95

Dave Ball
Dave Ball has a wide practice which has
often critically reflected on the arbitrariness
of individual reality. During his residency he
worked on ‘The Mountains of Wales', a
project of “observational drawings of hills
observed during my own ‘tours’ of Wales
which I undertook ‘in search of the Welsh
landscape’; accompanied by texts taken
from my own oral recollections of these
tours. They consist of banal anecdotes
about encounters with sheep, cows and
farmers, information about the weather,
descriptions of my moods, and stuttering
and inarticulate attempts to describe the
landscape around me.
Although I was born and brought up on the
side of a hill in the Swansea Valley, I had
never really focussed before on the Welsh
landscape as a subject. My residency in
Aberystwyth therefore represented
something of a “homecoming” for my
practice. Beginning with the notion that
national identity subsists in the landscape
of a particular region, the project explores
the connection between “Welshness”
and the hills and mountains of Wales.”
Dave Ball lives and works in Wales
and Berlin.
96

“something of a
‘homecoming’ for my
practice...in search of
the Welsh landscape”

www.daveballartist.co.uk

David Brazier & Kelda Free
David and Kelda's itinerant practice sees
them working site specifically, negotiating
the complex relationships that constitute
‘site’. They examine associations between
a location’s social, economic, political and
institutional dimensions and their personal
histories, working methodologies and
artistic autonomy. Seeking tensions within
these relationships, they employ a variety
of social forms and gestures in order to
interrogate and re-imagine the systems
and spaces they occupy.
Their work has been supported by
organisations that include Arts Council
England, Arcus Japan, Khoj International
Artists’ Association India, NAVA Australia
and California College of the Arts.

“This is a unique
programme in that
you’re given time,
space and freedom
to research and
concentrate, without
an emphasis on
producing and
exhibiting work.
It has been
invaluable.”

www.brazierfree.com
98

Catrin Davies & Lewis Wright
Originally from Liverpool and Tregaron, Catrin
Davies and Lewis Wright work as an artist
duo. Their collaborative work often references
the narratives found within the history of
painting; the battle for power is a key theme as
they examine human nature’s need to control.
Still life and installation is a focal point of their
practice, their inspiration the ever-changing
relationship between each other and with the
immediate world around them.
Catrin and Lewis’ practice reflects on current
ideologies and related human insecurities
within a media and information- saturated
world; they create changeable installations
using symbolic references with unpredictable
outcomes.
In many of their works, including those
completed on their residency in Aberystwyth,
they refer to the Classical painting tradition of
the still life where the objects symbolise the
larger narrative. The contrast of light and dark
found within classic still lives is explored
visually and conceptually. There are struggles,
pressures and tensions as well as moments of
unity, clarity and precision; ‘the painted surface
becomes a code for the viewer to crack’.
Both artists graduated from Kingston
University, London; they live in Wales.
100

Rhian Edwards
This 3 month writer residency was set up
by the Arts Centreâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Performing Arts and
Literature Department, funded by Literature
Wales, HAUL and Aberystwyth University.
Rhian led a series of creative workshops
with local writers and community groups,
gave performances, set up open mike
evenings and wrote poems inspired by her
stay in Aberystwyth. This is one of them.

A scattering corralled, lassoed
into the universal
doodle of birds,
a mutable speech bubble

The Universal Doodle

of pondering ‘m’s.
This is the bombast
of starlings as they
corkscrew the sky.
Each twist and fold
summarises them
to a simile, like iron filings,
flocked and flung
across the sky
by the metaphorical whims
of a magnet. Can you
hear the pathetic
fallacy, the siren song of a metal’s hum
crooning behind clouds,
a bit like a God.

Anna Falcini
Anna Falcini used her residency at Aberystwyth
to become more familiar with the area and to
explore “the treasures that are situated in
Aberystwyth from the beautiful & historic
landscape to the National Library of Wales…
My work is often concerned with the in-between
spaces, the ephemeral and the less prominent
aspects of a place. During my residency, I hope
to find interesting starting points in these lesserobserved places. I use video, text, drawing and
audio amongst other processes to realise my
ideas visually.
These are the tools of my trade where a dialogue between discovery and experimentation
happen.
I have always had a particular interest in estuary
landscapes and shorelines so coming to this part
of the Welsh coastline is going to be fascinating
for me. The Thames and Severn estuaries are
both familiar places of artistic investigation.
They have inspired continual engagement with
these territories.”

Anne Gibbs
“ I would like viewers to experience my
work as an abstract arrangement of form
and marks that is expressed mainly
through the medium of clay."
Anne Gibbs lives and works in Cardiff. She
uses collections of man-made and natural,
found objects as inspiration for her delicate
sculptures, working mainly in bone china.
Her process begins by sourcing materials
from local woodlands, antique shops and
market places which are then cast, stitched
or altered to transform them in to
something intricately unique.
The composition of each piece is integral
to the work, and the placement of every
component is highly considered. Such
precision reflects her interest in the
sensitivity, beauty and unrest inherent in
her surroundings and the resulting work
exudes these sensory qualities.
“In particular, I have found the irregular
land formations at Cwmystwyth to be truly
inspirational as well as the coastal areas of
Borth and Ynyslas.”

“I...found the irregular
land formations at
Cwmystwyth to be
truly inspirational”

www.annegibbs.co.uk
106

Alan Goulbourne
“My practice relies upon a process of
implementing order and chaos, effectively
within random sequences, in order to drive
a progression from a single moment and
mark to a vast crescendo of massing
marks and movements that collectively
represent something simple that is visually
riddled with complexity.”
Alan Goulbourne is a sculptor whose work
is a response to observations and
perspectives of his surroundings; he often
utilises offcuts of natural materials such as
wood or paper. Influenced by the
relationship between science and nature,
the resulting constructions are often
physically overwhelming in scale; he
explores the visual complexity of things that
may at first glance appear simple.
“I'm mainly influenced by relationships that
emerge visually between science and
nature, but I've been slowly aiming to shift
the direction on to observations of the
human condition. I imagine this transition
will take some time, but the residency has
given me some much needed down time
to consider this.”

“(my) practice is in a
general shift and the
residency has given
me some much
needed down time to
consider this”

resonance-art.co.uk
108

Eeva-Mari Haikala
Eeva-Mari Haikala is a Finnish artist working
mainly with performance, video and
photography. In recent years she has
focused on incorporating the painterly into
live performance and the moving image; as
well as in the relationship between text and
visual art works. She performs live, using her
own body and drawing on her memories as
a part of the composition.
One of the works created during her
residency was ‘I Was Waiting for You (My
Heart Will Go On)’, a video performance
which references the famous romantic scene
in ‘Titanic’. Haikala says about this work:
“There are many elements in it that occur
frequently in my work: the passage of time,
waiting, and an apparent absence of events.
.. The woman expects something to happen.
The situation in itself is absurd, perhaps even
sad: something or someone must be
missing, because she is alone. At the
moment of shooting, I created a performative
situation and a gesture: theoretically,
something could have happened –
someone could have come up from behind
me to support me. For a long time, I had an
alternative title to the work, ‘I waited here for
you seven minutes but you never arrived’.”
110

Doug Jones
Doug Jones’ sculptures and installations
invite us to reflect on personal and
collective desires, in the context of mass
consumerism and its global impact. His
work is often triggered by observation of
cultural phenomena: of various
commodities with their relative perceived
value/status within consumer culture,
events of historic and social significance,
the ‘production’ of heritage. Working on
different scales, from the impressively large
to more intimate, often utilising domestic
craft and consumable goods, Jones’
sculptures and installations challenge the
viewer to reconsider their expectations and
reflect on how once-innocent belief
systems can become corrupt. His works
have drawn on sources including
European ecclesiastical imagery as well as
shocking media images such as Mugabe's
rebels wreaking havoc in Toyotas. His
works offer insights into belief systems and
the shadowy narratives of concealed
worlds - whether that be the church or
British holidaymaker traditions.
Doug Jones lives and works in London.

“to reflect on personal
and collective desire
in the context of mass
consumerism”

www.cerihand.co.uk/artists/3/doug-jones

Kim Kielkhofner
Kim Kielhofner is a Montreal- based artist
best known for her videos, books, and
drawings; her work often centres on how
stories are told and how we understand
ourselves within them. She uses familiar
forms from cinema, literature and graphic
design and plays with our expectations
about what they will deliver.
“My work is rooted in an everyday process,
which allows my work not to be pinned
down before it is created but rather is
generated through the trajectories and
strategies of everyday living… Through
the repetitive practices of projecting the
self into an overriding narrative, the self
performs in a space that cannot be clearly
identified. Collecting images every day and
letting the narrative elements collect is part
of this process which allows for ambiguity
and fluidity, allowing a collapse between
self and other. I work with books,
installation, sound, performance and video
- all which are shaped by the materiality of
the everyday. In my artistic practice I am
interested in an aesthetic of intimacy and
the potential of multisensory experience.”

Matthew Macaulay
Matthew Macaulay makes paintings that
are unorthodox in their approach to
‘composition’; his approach could be called
an anti-composition, approaching a
cataloguing of visual statements, that
resists, at least for a few moments, forming
into a picture. The paintings are made to
be meditated on rather than reasoned with,
more to be “enjoyed” and “felt with the eye”
than “understood”.
The practice of painting seems to be
subject in itself, each painting is a visual
essay of an exploration that extends
Macaulay's intellectual and emotional
understanding of what painting could be.
There is an attempt to create new imagery
by using intuitive decision making, and not
being restricted to a prescriptive idea of
what the painting has to look like. Born
in Lerwick, Shetland Matthew Macaulay is
a graduate of Coventry University. and
Director of the artist-run Pluspace Gallery.

Valerian Mazataud
Valerian Mazataud is a French born
documentary photographer based in
Montreal, Canada. In his work he seeks the
“lost instant”, when bodies, looks, or facial
expressions tell more than they should;
issues around immigration, memory, loss
and community identities are his main
sources of inspirations. Orignally trained in
agricultural engineering, with a master's
degree in aquaculture, he is now a
freelance photo-journalist based in
Montreal, working with several newspapers
and magazines in Quebec and abroad.
During his residency in Aberystwyth,
Valerian experimented with abstract pinhole
sea landscapes- a long way from his usual
documentary photography work. He also
used the time to produce two books, Eigion,
a giant 1 meter long book and jours# a
small vertical book issued in only 2 copies.
“I remember my residency in Aberystwyth
as a real breath of fresh air, as much in my
artistic, professional and personal life. The
creative environment and the artistic
freedom I was given were like no others to
me. While in Aber, I had the opportunity to
challenge myself and use time to give a
new path to my career.”
118

Alison McDonald
Australian artist Alison McDonald’s
artworks form an intersection of sculpture,
consumer culture and environmental
concerns. The use of recycled materials
plays a critical role in conveying the
intended connotations.
“This residency was a particularly precious
opportunity with crucial breathing space that
enabled me to experiment and take new
risks, establish new points of departure for
my work whilst in a supportive environment.
From the bottom of Penglais Hill at the
beach, where I was able to discover the
wondrous array and abundance of Welsh
seaweeds, to the top of Penglais Hill where
I could access massive amounts of
recycled materials for my creations, Wales
was vital source of inspiration and avenue
to inform my work. I am still working
through ideas that were instilled and still
emerging from my time in Wales. Many
days I worked 10-12 hours a day in the
studio, often due to cold weather, it was
warmer and more comfortable to stay in my
studio where I was able to become very
absorbed in my work without any
interruptions, and for three months, it was
bliss. I will always treasure my time there.”
120

“It was fantastic to
experience Wales, and
Welsh culture, as a
resident… I will always
treasure my time there”

http://www.alisonmcdonald.com.au/
Umbrella Studios, Townsville

Rizwan Mirza
Rizwan Mirza received his BA in Photographic
Studies from Derby University, studying under
British landscape artist John Blakemore, and
his MA in Documentary Film from Goldsmiths
College, London. During his residency he
produced the body of work ‘From Dust to
Dust (again)’.

“I arrived in mid-Wales during a sudden
summer storm and discovered uprooted trees
violently dislodged from nearby forests which
were then abandoned downriver on a pebble
beach. The driftwood somehow seemed so
out of place in its new but temporary resting
place. It was during this time, I came across
several books published over a span of three
centuries: William Dalrymple’s The Last
Mughal, The Gathering Storm by Winston
Churchill and Sir Alexander Burns’sTravels
into Bukhara. …Each publication captured a
unique juncture in our shared history where
cultures have crossed paths and have often
faced insurmountable challenges, telling us a
great deal about our perception of the other.”

“I am not the light of
anyone's eye,
I give no solace to
another's heart.
Of no use to anyone,
I am but a fistful of
dust.”
Bahadur Shah Zafar, c1860

“a particularly
precious opportunity
with crucial
breathing space”

cargocollective.com/mirzar
122

Jenny Mulcahy
Jenny Mulcahy lives and works on Magnetic
Island, just off the northern coast of
Queensland, Australia. She primarily
works with ceramics, but often incorporates
found objects and printmaking techniques
in to her art.
Australia’s history of social injustice and
environmental issues feature thematically in
her work, as she tackles subjects such as
uranium mining, the plight of refugees from
war zones and the impact of natural
disasters. Whilst in Wales, however, an
entirely different environment to the arid
deserts of Queensland, she found time to
contemplate our human relationship with
place on a broader scale. In response she
created a series of small scale ceramic
pieces that formed a narrative of her stay.
“Being able to demonstrate my work to a
wider audience has opened up a range of
opportunities for me. An invitation to be
involved in the upcoming exhibition at the
Aberystwyth Arts Centre, having work
accepted for the Button Project and an
invitation to apply for a residency program in
France came about through other
professionals visiting my temporary studio at
Aberystwyth and seeing what I was doing.”
124

“Being able to
demonstrate my work
to a wider audience
has opened up a
range of opportunities
for me”

www.visualartist.info/jennymulcahy
Umbrella Studios Townsville

Edel O’Reilly
I am an inter-disciplinary artist with collaborative
work at the core of my practice and research,
with a strong focus on time-based and
situational, event-orientated works. My current
practice is concerned with the deconstruction
of cultural texts through disparate entertainment
and media formats as event-based installations
and participatory performances.
On graduating from Crawford College of Art
& Design, I became co-founder of arts
collective Cork Contemporary Projects and
co-director of project gallery The Space where
I developed the curatorial extension of my
practice. This core experience in self-initiated,
project based work which was responsive and
situational in nature, became deeply embedded
in my methodology of practice; leading to
positions with international platforms including
Frieze London, Boers-Li Gallery, Beijing and
Templebar Gallery + Studios Dublin. These
further informed my current work which
examines the shift within the cultural sector
towards more corporate, industrial and
entertainment based models and how this
affects both the artists and artist-audience
dynamic.
Edel took part in Aberystwyth Arts Centre’s
digital project ‘Only Connect’ in 2012.
126

Jill O’Sullivan
Jill O’Sullivan is an Australian artist who works
mainly in printmaking and drawing. For many
years she was interested in interpreting the
human condition and the domestic world but
through PhD research she turned to the art of
chorography - subjectively mapping place as
defined by Ptolemy. (According to Ptolemy,
chorography is a visual narrative that
characterises regional commonalites.)
“My present practice engages with the
chorographic mapping of place and results
from an on-going engagement with the
juxtaposition of theory, history of chorographic
practice and its application into contemporary
practice... It’s everything you ever wanted to
say about a place. The closer you are to a
place, the more the symbology of the stories
will reach you.”
During her residency, Jill experimented with
collages built up from old local ordinance maps,
worked on grisaille vignettes towards producing
a visual journal of her travels, on large charcoal
drawings, wood engravings and some digital
experimentation. The works ranged across
interpretations of the land, architecture and
human activity and most were a direct and
conceptual response to Aberystwyth, recording
local land, sea forms and historical architecture.
128

“the residency
undeniably has
been quite a catalyst
for my work, and a
great opportunity
that I do deeply
appreciate far more
than I can say. (and
of course for getting
really fit climbing the
hill each day )”

www.jillosullivanprintmaker.com
Umbrella Studios Townsville

Jennifer Price
Jennifer Price is a Fine Art Printmaker
living in London, studying her Masters in
Printmaking at the Royal College of Art
supported by a QEST scholarship.
Price’s artwork harnesses both basic and
traditional printmaking methods, then
stands them on their head, such that the
results cross artform. The work addresses
complex layers of material culture and the
role of the visual artist.
Price is drawn towards psychiatric inkblots,
which are open to interpretation and
invites the viewer to look beyond the
obvious. The links between psychiatric
inkblots and mental health issues are of
key importance to the artist; she aims to
raise awareness of mental health disorders
and draw our attention to the prejudice that
still surrounds those who suffer from them.
To create the artworks, the artist inks up
objects that we use in our society - such as
cars, shopping trolleys and post boxes.
‘The object is given eminence while
stripping it of its function. It is this oxymoron
of giving and taking at the same time that
sum up the warring sides of many mental
health conditions, such as mood and
personality disorders.’
130

“ It was an invaluable
experience… a lifechanging experience
and I now have friends
for life from it. Really
spectacular programme.
The work I produced got
me on to the Royal
College of Art's Masters
course in Printmaking”

jenniferpriceart.com

Natasha Rosling
Natasha Rosling lives and works in
London. Her large scale installations and
performances are underpinned by a
fascination with how the human body
negotiates the world – its mysterious
entwining of a present physical space
with personal and culturally mediated
memories. Throughout her thinking, there
is a constant attempt to come to terms with
the realities of embodiment, and the
impossibility of representing this
experience. Toying with themes such as
hypnotism, ventriloquism and the circus,
each work seeks new ways of fusing subhuman, non-human or super-human
realities into everyday places and
situations. Here, site specific installations,
performed conversations and sonic
landscapes are placed side by side together unravelling the boundaries
between the outside world and the inner
voices of the imagination.
Rosling is represented by Hidde van
Seggelen Gallery London, and is a
member of the pan-European research
group OuUnPo.

“I speak very highly
of the Arts Centre to
others in my field
after completing this
residency... there
was a mutually
enriching experience
and offering alternative
perspectives on ideas
and their development”

natasharosling.com
132

Nastja Säde Rönkkö
Nastja Säde Rönkkö is a Finnish artist,
who trained at the State Academy Art
Institute in Moscow before studying at
Central St Martins and the Slade in
London. Her work centres on performance,
exploring intimacy, empathy and belonging
across human interactions and social
rituals, from the everyday to the profound.
She has used video, text, installation,
photography and the internet as
extensions and outcomes of the
performances. She also shares a
collaborative practice with Shia LaBeouf
and Luke Turner. Rönkkö has performed
and exhibited internationally in venues
such as CCA Andratx Kunsthalle, Mallorca,
Spain, Galeria Tanja Wagner, Berlin,
Germany and Kiasma Museum of
Contemporary Art, Helsinki, Finland.
During her residency at Aberystwyth, she
worked on the performance and film
‘Till the Morning Comes’, in collaboration
with Luke Turner.

“Exploring intimacy,
empathy and
belonging across
human interactions
and social rituals…”

www.nastjar.com
Finnish Art Studios
134

Ingrid Schildermans
Ingrid Schildermans’ paintings are formed
of intense colours and lyrical brushstrokes,
simultaneously evocative of an archetypal
untamed land and a surrealist dreamlike
landscape. Driven by a curiosity towards
original and uncultivated nature, through
her practice she endeavours to discover
unknown places and lifestyles. “In Wales I
found more than I could hope for on my
quest for a contemporary wild and
dangerous natural environment,” she says.
“The necessity and drive to start my quest
there originates from the deafening
contrast with the Belgian landscape.”
The resulting work is entrenched in an
exploration of Welsh culture: spoken
mythological stories, intuitive impressions
and an engagement with the romanticised
elements.
“In Wales I discovered the freedom to think
in a mythological way in which the division
between fact and fiction is essential.
The spoken word has retained the right
to exist in Wales, and in this way, stories
obtain their own life in which fact and
fiction are intertwined. “
Ingrid Schildermans lives and works in
Belgium.
136

Sabrina Shah
“Whatever one’s calling in life, a lawyer, an
actress, a teacher, a fashion designer, a
mother, husband or wife or an artist, I
believe commitment & self-expression are
very important. In my work so far, I use an
amalgamation of imagery. I build
characters through observation of traits
and behaviour as portrayed in the media,
in relationships and in focused study of
everyday situations. In this way I have
explored the hidden interactions between
children, adults and animals. I continue to
explore ideas proposed by Schiller about
naivety. I chose to paint in a naïve style.
Painting in this style allows more scope for
interpretation and imagination by the
viewer. You are able to find your own
definitions more easily. I am beginning to
learn that naivety expressed in painting can
lead to originality.”
Sabrina Shah studied painting at Brighton
University, scenic art at the
Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts London
and attended The Prince's Drawing School
London as a postgraduate.

Elise Simard
Elise Simard has animated her way
through a dozen film productions, lending
her art to various documentary features
and animated shorts, and expanding her
own body of work through experimental
and exploratory filmmaking. Since
graduating from Concordia University in
2004, Simard has directed 7 shorts,
including the animated children's tale La
Traversée (2010), the tiny, lyrical musical
Breakfast (produced at the Aberystwyth Art
Centre in Wales in the fall of 2012), and
two National Film Board of Canada
productions; My Little Underground(2012)
and Sober (2014). Mixing the traditional
with the unconventional, her practice
borrows from a wide array of artistic
disciplines, from digital video to pinhole
photography, traditional and digital painting
and drawing, collage, time-lapse
photography and stop-motion animation.
Her films concern themselves with the
ordinary, the sublime and the imperceptible
affairs of our human states. Elise was born
and raised in Montreal.

Vida Simon
“My work incorporates drawing, writing,
sculptural objects, gesture, and sound,
which are combined to form siteresponsive installations and performances.
At the core of my practice is an
improvisational approach, which places
value on the contingencies of each
situation (such as architecture, season,
and social context). While my work is
visually-based, I try to create situations that
undo representation, through integrating
the viewer’s participation, obscuring
visibility, or revealing processes that are
normally kept “behind the scenes.” Linking
all aspects of my practice is a passion for
drawing, especially for its child-like
immediacy and capacity to intertwine
imagination with the present moment.
Working in this wonderful tin pod (light,
space, time) has allowed me to develop
diverging threads and themes
simultaneously – all under the umbrella of
Noah’s Flood. I have collected seaweed,
experimented with sheep’s wool, made
watercolours, drawn storyboards, played
with video, and devised new measurement
systems and forms of currency.”
Vida Simon works in Montreal
142

Tim Skinner
Tim Skinner’s work examines and explores
the potential of video as an expressionistic,
textural, organic medium.
“ 'Your work is very textural' remarked an AV
technician in the summer of 2011. This one
simple comment was a revelation and sent
me on a completely new visual enquiry,
questioning the textural possibilities and
versatility of the digital video medium. I wanted
to question the medium's relationship to
painting, exploring both its very materiality and
its ability to truly 'represent'.”
While working in Aberystwyth Tim set out to
“both visually and sonically embrace the
repetitive rhythmical make-up of the
surrounding local landscapes, with a view to
creating a collection of video work that
illustrates emotional attachment.” The resulting
work ‘Llosi Gwynt’ reflects today’s wind farms
and the legacy of coal mining; it was included
in the exhibition ‘I Like this place’ at
Aberystwyth Arts Centre in 2014 and is being
developed further. Tim Skinner was educated
at Colchester; he is based at Cuckoo Farm
Studios, Colchester.

Gerald Soworka
“Conceptually, my work is about ways of
being in the world and what it is to be
human. My artistic practice is predicated on
drawing, not just as a practice but as a
psychological and philosophical imperative
to see the world as it really is. Not as it
should or could be, but what is really there
in front of us.
This is not intrinsic to humans and for most
us must be learned. This is the true and
profound benefit of learning to draw and of
drawing the world.
My project at Aberystwyth, after Borges’
story of the cartographer, was to draw a
one to one scale map of the world.”
Gerald’s art work has always explored the
political from a very personal and
philosophical perspective and he engages
with social and environmental influences in
both his work and personal life; he has sat
on the board of the North Queensland
Conservation Council and been actively
involved in renewable energy and anti
fossil fuel campaigns.

Matthew Weir
Mathew Weir has become known for his
intricately observed and painstakingly created
oil paintings. Often simultaneously dark and
disturbing as well as aesthetically beautiful
and compelling, these paintings deal variously
with ideas of violence, race, sexuality, of death
and mortality; referencing a wide range of
visual, cultural and literary sources.
“The often politically incorrect nature of the
objects I choose to paint is highlighted and
exploited through my appropriation and
painterly manipulations. My paintings draw
attention to how the meaning of objects
changes when rendered in paint and reinterpreted within a contemporary context. I
want to create paintings that appear both
seductive and grotesque, which are
menacing yet still and calm. The paintings
shift between a subtle dark humour and
extreme violence…
A lineage of themes runs through the work,
weaving together ideas of oppression and
domination, mental and physical suffering and
their possible opposites; emancipation,
escape and death.”
Mathew Weir lives and works in London
where he is represented by Alison Jacques
Gallery .
148

Lucy Watts
Lucy Watts gives us visual and annotated
diaries from her travels where she
observes the everyday things we all take
for granted in our little parts of the world;
she serves up our idiosyncracies,
absurdities and prejudices and, gently
mocking, challenges our perceptions. She
lets us view our environment through her
eyes, both affectionate and quizzical; her
fluid draughtsmanship is totally convincing.
There is an anarchic quality to her
observations - like life, her visual and verbal
stories tend to be meandering and more
than slightly unhinged.
During her residency in Aberystwyth, Lucy
engaged with the everyday life around her,
sought out the odd little corners and drew
and wrote about her observations. Her
central focus was on the great British
institution of Fish & Chips … Her Fish &
Chip Review storyboard sees her
distinctive scratchy drawings beautifully
conveying the quirky human goings on in a
rural area of Wales, ending with a scene in
the ’best fish & chip shop in town.’
From ‘The Fish & Chip Review’ 2012; E.R.

“Fish and chips
became my main field
of research during my
residency period in
Aberystwyth.
I decided to bring the
popular institution in
the exhibition space”

lucywatts.com

Miranda Whall
Miranda Whall works in video, text, audio,
animation, drawing and installation. During
her residency she concentrated on part of
a series of new projects under the
collective title ‘The Quests’. An Arts Council
Wales Creative Wales Award gave her the
opportunity to develop the Quests during
2012/13 in countries including France,
Spain, Wales, Turkey, Mexico, Thailand
and Germany. All the ‘quests’ projects
include a place, a geographical landscape,
a subject/object, a human emotion, the
vocalization of a text as an audio recording
and video footage. The projects have
developed according to location-specific
responses and the dynamics that occur
within collaboration and participation.
Miranda Whall lives in Aberystwyth where
she is lecturer at the School of Art,
Aberystwyth University.

Clare Wilson
“My paintings evolve out of a process of
layering, removing, reworking and pushing
paint to find an inevitable form. The initial
chaos of poured paint and expressive
brushmarks that dominate the early stages of
the work are simplified and the uncomfortable
and disjointed shapes are dissolved - at least
partly, to create stillness. It is a slow process
and the results remain indeterminate as the
multi layering of muted tones reveal traces
and imprints of the origins of the paintings,
often submerged in a veiled light. I am not
concerned with the monumental or grand but
in the detail of a moment, curious shadows,
abstract movements, depths and recessions,
textures, memories and allowing the unknown
to resurface. Boundaries and borders intrigue
me, and how chance encounters can
interrupt and allow the fragile and unfamiliar to
emerge. Although these paintings are not
about place, subtle shifts of tone and a
restricted palette may refer to the diffused light
and intervals of landscape and its potential as
a space of transition and transformation.”
Clare Wilson was born in Northumberland;
she lives and works in London;
she completed an MA in Fine Art at the
University of Leeds
154

Tereza Zelenkova
“The photographic medium is for me tightly
bound to representing reality, and I often find
my practice to be largely influenced by my
whereabouts. I often travel as I find it easier to
conceive new works while in unfamiliar
environments and confronted with new
people and places.”
Photographer Tereza Zelenkova produces
monochromatic images that invoke the occult,
mortality and mysticism. Inspired by travel and
her experiences of unfamiliar environments,
she documents mysterious artefacts from
nature. By beginning her process intuitively,
collecting images of objects and places she
feels drawn to, she later regains control
through editing and contemplation. The
resulting work is personal and reflective and
these mysterious artefacts begin to take on a
supernatural aura. Although the medium is
clearly grounded in representing reality, her
photographs deliberately lack ties with any
particular place or event. “They usually refer to
imaginary spaces or the world as a whole”,
she says. “Perhaps if there were a genre of
the ‘metaphysical document’, my photos
could belong to it.”
Born in Ostrava, Czech Republic, Tereza
now lives and works in London.
156

“if there were a genre
of the ‘metaphysical
document’, my photos
could belong to it”

www.terezazelenkova.com

"... programmes such as this are
extremely beneficial to the local arts
community in terms of keeping them
vibrant, and from becoming too insular.
I was amazed at the level of
participation from the community to
events at the Centre."
"...the whole programme is making
Aberystwyth a richer and more
innovative artistic hub. The accumulation
of artists from different cultures and
practices has [made this happen]."
158